Locals say they face ‘David and Goliath’ fight as college scales back building plans

Hughes Hall bought the land three years ago but residents still fear the college’s plans for new buildings will leave them ‘horribly enclosed’

Residents are still concerned about plans to build next to Fenner’s cricket ground as Hughes Hall prepares to submit a full planning application.

The Cambridge University college bought the land three years ago with plans to build student accommodation there. It has since held a series of drop-in events for residents. Several drawings have been shared and a full planning application is expected to be submitted before July.

Hughes Hall said the new buildings are needed to “improve and increase academic spaces”. They are also intended allow more students to be housed on-campus so they can “benefit from a supportive community environment” and reduce reliance on the private rental market, since only around 34% of Hughes Hall students can currently be housed on campus.

The college has proposed building on four sites. One that will replace an existing pavilion at the Margaret Wileman building has caused Covent Garden residents concern.

Eileen O’Brien, landlady of the Six Bells and Covent Garden resident, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service she fears the new building will block light from reaching her back garden.

The 69-year-old said: “We would feel horribly enclosed, it would block out the light and, frankly, I think a lot of my neighbours would think about selling and the community that’s been established here for decades would be decimated.”

Hughes Hall will be demolishing the existing pavilion, which the college says is no longer able to support academic requirements.

Eileen said the one to two-storey building is already “massive” and the college wants to replace it with a three-storey building. This has been updated to partly two storeys on the latest published plans.

She said: “For years, people kept saying to me – ‘why have you got a spacecraft in the back garden?’ I’ve got used to it and now they want to build a three-storey block of student accommodation in my back yard.”

Plans published online show the replacement building stepping from two to three storeys and further back from the boundary than the pavilion. To stop the rooms from looking directly into back gardens, frosted glass has been proposed.

Eileen said: “How horrible to live somewhere where you can’t look out the window – like living in a toilet. Not very nice for the students who’ll be there for nine months – not very nice for the residents who’ve been here for decades.”

Glisson Road resident Andrew Warren shared concerns that it could set a precedent and said that protected open space “ought to be sacrosanct”. The 77-year-old said: “There are not very many of these spaces in central Cambridge and certainly not in the Petersfield area and we want to see that retained.

“If you get the right to develop part of Fenner’s – and we have the tennis courts right there – once the council has set the precedent of saying, yes, you can do that – then it’s much more difficult to say no in planning terms.”

Covent Garden resident Ian Bent said it’s “almost the home of cricket” and said the situation had been “frustrating” for residents.

The 88-year-old said: “When they purchased this land they wanted to build all the way along, and a three-storey building behind Glisson Road. It was our resistance that prevented them from doing that but they still, stubbornly, insist on building on this land.”

Tony Murphy, another local resident, compared their fight to David versus Goliath. He said he fears they won’t hear the birds sing anymore when the trees are cut down during construction.

The 71-year-old said: “We get sunlight quite late in the evening in our back gardens, so it’s lovely to sit out and read a book or something – that’s all going to be gone. Hopefully now we’ve got a Green politician, maybe they’ll lean more towards our side.” A petition was started on Change.org around two years ago and is now approaching 5,000 signatures.

Sir Laurie Bristow, president of Hughes Hall, thanked residents for joining drop-in sessions and said the college had listened to feedback. He said: “In response to resident feedback, we have moved as much of the proposed development away from our neighbours as possible with 70% of new student accommodation now proposed on two previously developed brownfield sites.

“We have also reduced the size of the Pavilion Building replacement, Wileman Court, to two storeys adjacent to the Covent Garden boundary, only stepping up to three storeys at the front to match the height of the existing Margaret Wileman Building. We are also proposing site-wide landscaping and gardens, and are talking to our immediate neighbours about new pedestrian access on Covent Garden.

“These changes will give both the College and neighbours access to more and better open spaces.”